With Saubhik Chakrabarti
In his first major interview since the BJP’s 2009 election defeat, LK Advani, no longer the party leader but very much the influential party elder, ponders the consequences of his Rath Yatras. This is the 20th anniversary of his Somnath-Ayodhya Yatra. He argues that religiosity in politics is different from and superior to religion in politics. The BJP, he says, missed an opportunity when it responded negatively to his Jinnah statements.
In a wide-ranging conversation with Vandita Mishra and Saubhik Chakrabarti, Advani talks about not just politics, but politicians, from Atal Bihari Vajpayee to Sonia Gandhi, and Rajiv to Rahul Gandhi. That politics is less courteous now is thanks to, he suggests, Sonia’s style and maybe the campaign against her after the 2004 verdict. He is yet to find a journalist, he says, who has interviewed Rahul Gandhi.
You’re the rath yatri of Indian politics. You undertook at least three major yatras – the Ayodhya Yatra, the Swarna Jayanti Rath Yatra and the Bharat Uday Yatra.
The first rath yatra from Somnath to Ayodhya that ended when I was arrested at Samastipur gave me an understanding of how, for a political person, there is nothing more effective than a yatra. At public meetings, most of those who come are either already committed to your viewpoint or they come out of curiosity. In a yatra, you are reaching out to people.
When you undertook the first yatra in 1990, politics was in ferment and you represented a challenge to the prevailing political consensus.
That yatra may have impressed some, won me supporters, and made my opponents angrier. But I recall that as a time of major education for me.
I did not come straight to politics. I joined RSS at the age of 14. My initial urge in public life was to be part of an organisation that builds character and discipline and infuses patriotism in the youth for the purpose of liberating the country. The RSS was not a religious organisation for me. I did not think I was going to a religious organisation. But the rath yatra made me think; suddenly, I saw a kind of reaction I had never seen before. After we started from Somnath and while we were passing through Gujarat, I asked, What’s happening?
Pramod Mahajan was with me and in a way it had been his idea. Earlier, I had thought of a pad yatra, since that’s what political leaders did, but Pramod said it would take too long and I would be able to cover only a few states. He suggested I take a vehicle to cover a longer distance and meet more people. I thought of a jeep. And he said, suppose we convert the vehicle into a rath. My first reaction was, no,I am too prosaic a person,this is too theatrical for me. But it was a new idea.
What I found in the yatra was something astounding. I had read Vivekananda and he repeatedly says that religion is the soul of India. Whatever you want to teach, teach it in the idiom of religion. I did not comprehend it. But then, for the first time, I understood him.
People may not have known who Advani was, but they knew it was for the temple. They wanted to touch the rath, kiss the ground on which it passed. I realised it’s the language of religion that can create greater patriotism than I had seen before. It was a time of education for me.
Did the passion that you saw worry you as well?
If the passion was to be related only to one temple, it would not hold. But I feel that if anyone tries to undermine religiosity, he will not be able to create patriotism. It made me understand why someone like Mahatma Gandhi did not hesitate to start his meetings with Raghupati Raghav Raja Ram. He meant not religion, but religiosity. You could be a Hindu, a Muslim, a Christian, but whatever religion you may belong to, Indian ethics is derived from religiosity. Religiosity gives ethical commitment.
At the same time, the world over, if there is any field where intolerance is most manifest, it is religion. Scientists have been tried and persecuted because their viewpoint did not match the scriptures. But in India, if democracy has succeeded, it is because our tradition, even in the field of religion, gives space for the acceptance of a totally different point of view. In India, even an atheist and rank materialist like Charvaka is described as a rishi. If you think secularism means that there is something wrong with religion, or, as the Marxists say, it is the opiate of the masses, I do not subscribe to that.
My own rituals used to be Sikh rituals. In my home, the holy book was the Guru Granth Sahib. My grandmother used to write letters to her relatives in Sindhi but in Gurmukhi script.
But were you concerned that the religiosity that you saw on the ground could degenerate into violence?
No, I never thought that creating a climate in support of the temple could lead to intolerance. As Koenraad Elst wrote in his book The Saffron Swastika later, there was not a single instance of bloodletting in the areas the rath yatra passed through, not a single one.
Discipline has been part of my make-up. There are political parties in the country that don’t have that. But the Jana Sangh-RSS-BJP do not approve of anything that smacks of indiscipline. It is rare that an agitation started by the Jana Sangh-BJP has led to violence.
Yes, when the structure was demolished, it did bother me. I wrote about it publicly, which was not approved of by certain sections. It is true that when a movement by a party becomes a mass movement, it can lose control. The RSS leadership had pleaded many times with the government to approach the court for a judgment before the kar seva date.
Can a similar mobilisation, another rath yatra, happen in India 2010?
Well, it depends on the purpose of the yatra. I can only say that political meetings have dwindled in cities but not in the countryside. There are large meetings still,and not just for elections. In a democracy, there is always a need to find a way to talk to people; and different communication strategies have various levels of influence in India because of the large population.
One of your stated impulses for the second yatra, the Swarna Jayanti Rath Yatra of ’97, was your worry about the image of the Ugly Politician. Has it grown over the years?
When we got freedom, all of us expected that within a few years, we would set everything right. But, basically, we have not been able to give good governance, make the transition from swaraj to su-raj. Even if those who rule are good, things won’t change much if the people remain what they are.
In 1970,I was travelling on a train with another MP. We had dinner together along with some of his friends. When the canteen-wallah came for the money, my fellow MP was outraged how can an MP be asked to pay? I said,I will pay.
More recently, I told my party, no one is to ask for a pay raise. Ever since I became an MP, I have been against MPs deciding their own salaries. It should be done by a separate body not comprising MPs.
What does power mean to you?
My generation had the advantage of coming to public life at a time when the overriding motivation was freedom. It was not a career. It was a mission that we accepted, and everyone did it in their own way.
Today, when young people come to me, wanting to join politics and the BJP,I tell them, I would not advise you to do so. If you want to become a doctor, become one, prove your competence in your field, complete your education, and then think of politics. Politics is no longer a mission anywhere in the world. But I expect everyone who comes to politics to accept it as a place where there must be professional integrity.
In no country does political office give a person as much clout as it does in India, far in excess of a person’s intrinsic merit. I would say the same thing about journalists,because these are the two professions I have seen. This is the root of many distortions,and the image of the Ugly Politician.
In your autobiography My Country My Life, you recall your diffidence in public speaking, especially since you felt that Vajpayee was the one who had a way with words. Yet you became the BJP’s mass campaigner.
I was diffident in the early years. On the eve of a party session in 1973, a meeting of citizens was called and I was asked to address it. Till date, I don’t know what I said to them. I was so nervous.
Even when I was about to become president of the party in 1973, Atalji chided me, why are you nervous, you speak so well in Parliament. I said it is different from speaking in Parliament, where the audience is familiar, smaller.
In your book, you also recount the moment when a wheelchair-bound Jayaprakash Narayan swore newly elected Janata Party MPs to service to the nation at Rajghat. Where have the symbols, which could capture the political moment and the people’s imagination, gone? Why can’t politicians find them anymore?
Times have changed. But the arrival of dynastic rule has also greatly detracted from the impact of true leadership. In the Congress, they don’t react overtly anymore; there is whispering. It wasn’t always so. We were told that when (Jawaharlal) Nehru said Indira would be party president,(Govind Ballabh) Pantji had expressed some reservations.
I have not seen much of Sonia and Rahul. I search for journalists who have talked to Rahul. Can you sit and talk to him?
I can’t understand, but someone must be advising her (Sonia). In the last session,s he disappeared from Parliament for a while. Even Congressmen did not know where she was. Later, it was revealed that she had gone to the US. Why be secretive about something like that? There is needless speculation.
Do you remember your first meeting with Indira Gandhi?
I don’t remember the first meeting, but I met her several times. She was accessible. One day, Atalji and I had met her for some reason, and we said we were going to Punjab. The state was torn by terrorism. It was the 1980s. Our party workers had been killed. She said why are you going,it is dangerous.
And Rajiv?
My first meeting with Rajiv started with him saying, you’ve been in Parliament, I ‘ve just come in. He started on that note. One of the subjects that interested me was electoral reform. I mentioned a few things and he said he would tell the law minister. Later,(law minister HR) Bhardwaj came to my place,he told me that Rajiv had asked him to discuss my ideas on electoral reform.
This was Rajiv’s style, always cordial, warm, respectful. When my father passed away in Gujarat in 1985, I was living in Pandara Park in Delhi. When I came back from the funeral, Rajiv came to my home to offer condolences. In that same meeting, he said, Muslims are furious about (the) Shah Bano (judgment). I said this was expected. I asked him, what are you thinking of? I said the government’s stand as explained by Arif (Mohammad Khan) was correct. But he said ,we have to do something. That’s when I sensed he had something on his mind.
When did the cordiality that marked the relationship between political opponents begin to wane?
Even with (PV) Narasimha Rao, though things began well, they changed. I certainly felt bad after I was falsely implicated in the hawala case. Yet I still went to his iftar after that.
But no one from the Congress came for the release of my autobiography. When I was asked about it in an interview, it gave me an idea. And my wife Kamla and I went to present Sonia the book, the one and only time I have visited her house. She was cordial. I asked for tea, but coffee came. Kamla doesn’t take coffee.
Did things change because of the BJP-led campaign on Sonia Gandhi’s foreign origins?
Perhaps, a Congressman will be able to tell you better. Some people from our side reacted when there was a possibility of her becoming PM. Maybe there was an effect. But her coming to office, becoming the head of the party, was a turning point.
How disappointed were you with the outcome of the 2004 polls, and then in 2009 when you lost your chance to be prime minister?
What is the disappointment? I have been in politics for 60 years. Until 20 years ago, no one expected us to ever come to power.
Isn’ t there loneliness, now that you’ve stepped back from day-to-day politics?
I have spent my political life with Atalji. I miss him greatly. He is three years older than me but a colleague three years younger like George Fernandes is also in no position to be of assistance. The absence of both these colleagues makes me very sad.
Any regrets, any what-ifs, things you might have done differently?
On Kashmir, on Kashmiri Pandits, we have not made progress, even when the NDA was in office. Or on electoral reform, the public funding of elections. I wish we had done it.
Those were your government’s missed opportunities. Personally, for you?
What do I say? For me, the problem in the party began after the Pakistan yatra. I don’ t believe I made a mistake. I felt distressed when my party turned away (from me). But my greater regret is that my party lost an opportunity.
I had never imagined that a single statement of fact what Jinnah said in the Constituent Assembly would create such a problem. But what I saw in Pakistan in six days was amazing: before I went there, Advani was the biggest enemy of Pakistan, and Muslims. By the end of my visit, the general image in the government and people was that he is proud of his Hinduism but he is not anti-Pakistan or anti-Muslim.
If there had been no problem in the party, the BJP also would have got the same image. My party lost an opportunity.
Looking back at the Ayodhya yatra and then the Pakistan yatra do you see yourself as an interventionist, or someone who was buffeted by larger forces of history, unexpected turns of events and unintended consequences?
You have put both together, the Pakistan yatra and the rath yatra. So far as the rath yatra is concerned, I’ll admit I did not expect the demolition. While pressing his case before the PM,(RSS) Rajju Bhaiyya had said lest something untoward happens. He was asking the government to ask for the judgment before the due date.
If I had any apprehension that the incident could take place,I would not have gone to Ayodhya. Several attempts were made by people on the dais to restrain those who were engaged in the demolition ,but they had no effect. When I pleaded with the police officer in charge of my security to allow me to go down to where it was happening, she did not permit it.
As far as the Pakistan yatra is concerned, it was not an attempt on my part to change my image. When I addressed a gathering in Karachi during the visit,I recalled how when Swami Ranganathananda was president of the Ramakrishna Mission there, I used to go for his lectures. Towards the end of his life,I met him in Kolkata and he recalled our days in Karachi. He was on a wheelchair, he was 95-96. He asked me if I had read Jinnah’s speech in Pakistan’s Constituent Assembly. He said, read it again, it is a strong advocacy of the secular state. I got a copy and sent it to him. Then the Pakistan government invited me for the project of the restoration of the Katas Raj temples.
You say you would not have gone to Ayodhya if you had known the demolition would take place. Would you have gone to Pakistan if you had known the consequences?
I’d still have gone to Pakistan. I see nothing wrong with my quoting Jinnah. Looking back I’ve no regrets. I’d still have gone.
What do you see as the future of the BJP? Do you think it needs to shift more to the centre or further to the right?
The right and left terminology is not entirely applicable in India. The right is identified with conservatism, not being in favour of change. With abject poverty, backwardness and illiteracy, can any political party be against change in India? A really conservative set-up would not have dared to go in for liberalisation. They would have said what Nehru said was right,we must retain a centrally controlled and coordinated mechanism. But we (the BJP) criticised the licence-quota raj, though many felt our government would not do so because of our stand on swadeshi.
You see how our (BJP) state governments are functioning. Earlier, whether it was Deendayalji or Atalji, the main leaders of the party always had a very open approach. Those who were really conservative would call them communists’.
Which books have influenced you the most?
I have been a reader all my life. Many books have influenced my character, nature, thinking, temperament. When I was 14,(RSS leader) Rajpal Puri asked,‘Do you have the habit of reading? He gave me Dale Carnegie’s How to Win Friends and Influence People. I still remember examples from it. What I learnt from the book was, don’ t argue beyond a point. If a person doesn’t agree with you, put forth your viewpoint, but don’t think that you can change his views. Then I read (VD) Savarkar’s 1857: The First War of Independence.
I entered college in 1942, the year of the Quit India movement. There were no classes, colleges were closed. I would be in the library, reading the classics,Charles Dickens, Alexander Dumas, RL Stevenson, a lot of fiction. In 1947,I was 20 when I came to Rajasthan as a pracharak. And my biggest disadvantage was that I didn’t know Hindi,I knew only Sindhi and English. I started teaching myself the language by reading Hindi books.
I read even the Ramayana and the Mahabharata in Sindhi. Then I read the epics in English. After I learnt Hindi,I read KM Munshi’s Jai Somnath and several historical novels.
I believe one of the greatest propagators of the Hindi language has been Hindi cinema. Because I used to watch Hindi films,I wasn’t unfamiliar with the language. When I became Information and Broadcasting minister, I used to say that there may still be an anti-Hindi atmosphere in places like Tamil Nadu but it says something that the centre of Hindi cinema, Mumbai, is not a Hindi-speaking city.
You mention in your autobiography that we’ ve not been able to render our epics on screen,like the Ten Commandments.
As I&B minister,I convened a meeting on this issue. I called filmmakers and asked them why don’t we make use of the Ramayana and Mahabharata. I could remember only Ram Rajya starring Shobhana Samarth, with Vasant Desai’s music.
Then Ramanand Sagar made Ramayan for TV and it became a phenomenon, not because of the quality of the serial (BR Chopra’s) Mahabharat was far better but simply because it was the Ramayana. It’s a story every Hindu household is familiar with, everyone knows what is the Lakshman rekha. Perhaps today a Karan Johar will make the Ramayana.
This interview was originally published on September 19, 2010.